Day 26 – Indian Head to Broadview (T.D.: 88.5km; S.T.: 5h59min)

Bellies full of instant oatmeal, we began a slow crawl out of Indian Head and towards the Manitoba border. A strong headwind today meant that we weren’t about to break any speed records getting there. (As a matter of fact, we did set a new speed record today. Unfortunately, it was for slowest average speed – beating out our day slogging it up to the top of Roger’s Pass even). Three hours on the road brought us to Wollesley, a mere 30 kilometres from our campground, where we bailed out, dog-tired, to have lunch, rest, and see if the wind would change directions. Wollesley is a self-proclaimed “Town Around A Lake,” which, of course, amazed and delighted us. The man at the visitor info centre was quite adamant that we go have a look at the lake, and so we did. It was nice.
Most importantly, during our sojourn there, the winds died down a bit, which made for slightly speedier progress getting to Grenfell, where we stopped for another snack. To our great dismay, however, while we enjoyed our snack of dried fruit and cashews (how healthy are we?), the winds picked up again. We made it another 20km to Broadview, where we gave up, beaten by the wind. On a lighter note, Broadview is the home of Sergeant Bill, Canada’s oldest mascot. Sergeant Bill is a goat – was a goat. He’s dead now. (Can you tell it was a slow day today?).

To cap off our misfortune, we ordered a pizza at Kaycee’s Roadhouse, and after laboriously explaining to the waitress that we wanted one side with pepperoni and veggies (for me) and one side with just veggies (for Caroline), she brought us one with pepperoni and veggies on one side and just pepperoni on the other. Caroline enjoyed the extra protein. It had been a hard day, after all.

Stats:

Av. Spd.: 14.7km/h (a fine average speed – if we were RUNNING across the country)
Mx. Spd.: 23.7km/h (Such great heights! This came as we rolled into Broadview at the very end of the day, off a lightly inclined overpass).

Number of other campers at the campsite: 0

Number of bathrooms at the campsite: 0 (you can’t really count the little-bit-too-full-for-my-liking port-a-potty – or maybe I’m just high-maintenance)

Number of hayfields that could substitute for a bathroom if absolutely necessary: 1

Number of spectacular sunsets that redeemed the day: 0 (It wasn’t a very good day.

…Actually, I’m lying, it was pretty decent. I’m just being dramatic to make things more interesting for you.)